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<?php pagehead(_("Estimates of the number of Linux users")) ?>
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<?php pagetop(_("Estimating the number of Linux users")) ?>
	<H2>
		<?php print _("(or: why we think we're twenty-nine million)") ?> 
	</H2>
	<P>
		<?php print _("Last updated: march 2005") ?> 
 
	<H6> 
		<?php print _("Note: in this articles, the suffixes K and M are used.") ?> 
		<A HREF='http://www.ex.ac.uk/cimt/dictunit/dictunit.htm#prefixes'>(SI)</A>.
		<BR>
			<?php print _("This is also done to prevent mistakes about comma and dot notation differences in the US / Europe.") ?>
		<BR>M=1.000.000 = 10^6
		<BR>K= 1.000 = 10^3
	</H6>
 

 
	<P>
		<?php print _("It is VERY hard to get any real idea of the size of the Linux community.") ?> 
 
	<P>
		<?php print _("In a sense, it is because we want it that way: we") ?> 
		<A HREF='http://cbbrowne.com/info/lsf.html'><?php print _("do NOT want") ?></A> 
		 <?php print _("anything like centralized control, and that means that we don't want anyone to say authoritatively how many people we are, either.") ?> 
 
	<P>
		<?php print _("The only number we can be sure of is \"many\".") ?> 
 
	<P>
		<?php print _("The lower limit is something like") ?> 
		<A HREF='/'><?php print _("what is counted") ?></A> 
		<?php print _("in the Linux Counter (140.000 at the moment), but even this is not certain; people may have stopped using Linux after registering, or may be registered under 2 different emails.") ?> 
 
	<P>
		<?php print _("The Linux Counter also has several builtin drawbacks:") ?> 
 
		<UL>
    			<LI> <?php print _("Only people who run across mention of it on Linux enthusiast web pages are likely to hear about it, although several important Linux documents also mention it") ?> 
    			<LI> <?php print _("Only people with E-mail or Web access can register with it") ?> 
    			<LI> <?php print _("Accounts of people who forget to re-visit the website") ?> 
			<A HREF='http://counter.li.org/news/deletion.php'><?php print _("are deleted") ?></A> 
			<?php print _("after two years.") ?> 
    			<LI> <?php print _("And most importantly: Only people who *care* to be registered can be counted.") ?>  
		</UL>
 
	<P>
		<H4>
			<?php print _("The main reasoning for the estimation is as follows:") ?> 
		</H4>
 
	<P>
		<?php print _("In 2001, here at the Linux Counter, it was estimated") ?> <B> 
		<A HREF="estimates-previous.php"> <?php print _("18 million users") ?></A> <?php print _("use Linux.") ?> </B>
		<BR><?php print _("At that moment, around 110k users") ?> 
		<A HREF='reports/short.php'><?php print _("were registered") ?></A> 
		<?php print _("at the Linux Counter. Nowadays, 140k users") ?>
		<A HREF='/'><?php print _("are registered") ?></A>
		<?php print _("at the Linux Counter, but in october 2001") ?> 
		<A HREF='reports/short.php'><?php print _("200k users were registered") ?></A>, <?php print _("and the users who didn't visited their accounts within the last two years") ?> 
		<A HREF='news/deletion.php'><?php print _("were deleted") ?></A>.
		<BR><?php print _("But, not everyone who didn't visit their account stopped using Linux.") ?> 
		<BR><?php print _("So, if we estimate 40K of the 90K removed users still use Linux, we could estimate 180k unique users should be in the Linux Counter, of which 40k should have visited the Linux Counter to keep their entries alive, but didn't.") ?> 
		<BR><BR><?php print _("As a result of that, the next table emerges:") ?> 
		<BR><BR>
		
 		<TABLE border=2 cellpadding=5>

			<TR>
				<TD><I><?php print _("Calculating the new number of Linux users") ?></I>
				<TD> <?php print _("June 2001") ?>
				<TD> <?php print _("February 2005") ?> 
			</TR>
			<TR>
				<TD>	<?php print _("Linux Counter registered users") ?>  
				<TD>	110K
				<TD>	180K
			</TR>
			<TR>
				<TD><?php print _("Estimated Linux users") ?>
				<TD>18M
				<TD>29M
			</TR> 
 		</TABLE>
		
		
	<P>
		<BR><?php print _("The number of") ?> <B><?php print _("29 million") ?></B> <?php print _("is the result of first calculating the factor at which the number of registered Linux Counter members grew") ?> (180/110 ~= 1.6)
		<BR><?php print _("Then, we apply that factor to the estimated number of Linux users of june 2001") ?> (1.6 x 18M).
 
	<P>
		<H3>
			<?php print _("There are many other pointers to follow:") ?> 
		</H3>
		<UL>
			<LI> <B><?php print _("Red Hat's size the market.") ?> </B>
			<BR><BR><?php print _("The next table emerges:") ?> 
			<BR><BR>
			<TABLE border=2 cellpadding=5>
				<tr>
					<TH> <?php print _("DATE") ?>
					<TH> <?php print _("NUMBER") ?>
					<TH> <?php print _("SOURCE") ?>
				</tr>
				<TR>
					<TD><?php print _("Dec 1996") ?>	
					<TD>3.5 M
					<TD><?php print _("Red Hat's size the market") ?>
				</TR>
				<TR>
					<TD><?php print _("Mar 1998") ?>
					<TD>7.5 M
					<TD><?php print _("Red Hat's size the market") ?>
				</TR>
				<TR>
					<TD><?php print _("Jun 2001") ?>
					<TD>18 M
					<TD><?php print _("Linux Counter") ?>
				</TR>
				<TR>
					<TD><I><?php print _("March 2005") ?></I>
					<TD><I>29 M</I>
					<TD><I><?php print _("Extrapolation of the other sources") ?></I>
				</TR>
			</TABLE>
			<BR>
			<BR><?php print _("The first three rows show a linear growth, and that is extrapolated to the fourth row.") ?>
			<BR><?php print _("This is") ?> <U><?php print _("exactly what we stated") ?></U> <?php print _("if we only take the growth in Linux Counter registrants.") ?>	 
 
			<BR><BR>
			<LI>
				<B> <?php print _("Gartner estimates in 2002, 500M computers") ?></B>
				<A HREF='http://homepage.mac.com/techedgeezine/1billion_served.html'><?php print _("were deployed") ?></A>. 
 				<BR><?php print _("For several years,") ?> 
				<A HREF='http://www.google.com/press/zeitgeist/zeitgeist-jun04.html '><?php print _("Google thinks") ?></A> <?php print _("1% of the users of internet connected computers use Linux, but this number may be to low.") ?> 
				<BR><?php print _("If we multiply this 1% with the 500M computers, at least 5M people should use Linux.") ?>
			<BR><BR>
			<LI><B><?php print _("The LXer") ?> 
				<A HREF='http://lxer.com/module/db/viewby.php?uid=108&amp;option=&amp;value=&amp;sort=108&amp;offset=0&amp;dbn=12'><?php print _("database of groups migrating to Linux") ?></A></B>
				<BR><?php print _("A raw estimate of the computers mentioned here would be 1 million.") ?> 
 			<BR><BR>
			<LI>
				<B><?php print _("A consortium called \"The China Standard Software\" was set up to") ?> 
				<A HREF='http://www.techworld.com/news/index.cfm?fuseaction=displaynews&amp;NewsID=674'><?php print _("bring a Linux-based desktop") ?></A>
				<?php print _("to 200 million Chinese computer users.") ?> </B>
			<BR><BR>
			<LI>
				<B><?php print _("A") ?> 
				<A HREF='http://www.netcraft.com/Survey/index-200106.html#computers'><?php print _("Netcraft study") ?></A>
				<?php print _("revealed, in march 2001, (29 + 3) % of the physical computers used to serve websites run Linux.") ?></B>
				<BR><?php print _("Though the actual total number of physical computers used to serve websites is not told, this must also be a big number, so much users must use these computers to keep the websites up to date.") ?> 
			<BR><BR>
			<LI>
				<B><?php print _("The number of") ?> 
				<A HREF='http://www.linuxdevices.com/articles/AT9423084269.html '><?php print _("devices using Linux") ?></A>
				<?php print _("is growing.") ?></B>
				<BR><?php print _("For example, many modem-like devices, Audio Video entertainment devices like TiVo, and a growing number of mobile phones run Linux. Users of devices could be called Linux users.") ?> 
		</UL>

	<P>
		<?php print _("Another way of estimating the popularity of Linux is doing some google searches.") ?> 
		<BR><?php print _("For february 2005, teoma and google added together gave the following number of hits") . "*" ?>
		<BR>
		<TABLE border=2 cellpadding=5>
			<tr>
				<TH> <?php print _("OS") ?>
				<TH> <?php print _("Hits") ?>
			</tr>
			<TR>
				<TD>Linux + linspire
				<TD align=right>269 M
			</TR>
			<TR>
				<TD>Win3.1/95/98/2000/ME
				<TD>88 M
			</TR>
			<TR>
				<TD>Win2003/Server
				<TD>19 M
			</TR>
			<TR>
				<TD>WinXP
				<TD>33 M
			</TR> 
			<TR>
				<TD>WinNT
				<TD>33 M 
			</TR> 
			<TR>
				<TD>WinLonghorn
				<TD>33 M
			</TR> 
			<TR>
				<TD><?php print _("TOTAL WINDOWS") ?>
				<TD>162 M
			</TR> 
			<TR>
				<TD>Solaris
				<TD>27 M
			</TR> 
			<TR>
				<TD>*BSD
				<TD>55 M
			</TR> 
			<TR>
				<TD>NetWare (Novell)
				<TD>7 M
			</TR> 
			<TR>
				<TD>Mac (Os X)
				<TD>6 M
			</TR>
		</TABLE>
		<P><FONT size=1> 
		<I> <?php print _("Bash-Script can be downloaded, depends on the lynx browser to run.") ?> </I></FONT>
 
	<P>
		<?php print _("So there is no doubt by now: Linux is the most talked about OS on the Net!") ?> 
		<BR><I><?php print _("(Notify me if you try the search and the numbers diverge very much!)") ?> </I>
 
		<BR><BR><H3><?php print _("Some ways not to estimate") ?> </H3>
 
		<BR><?php print _("Some measures are lower than others.") ?> 
 
		<BR><BR><?php print _("One in particular that is low is estimates based on the number of browsers identifying themselves as Linux. Problem with this kind of measurements is that many sites expect a version of Microsoft Internet Explorer or Netscape before you can use the site. So many people, using other browsers like") ?> 
		<A HREF='http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/'>Firefox</A>, 
		<A HREF='http://www.mozilla.org/products/mozilla1.x/'>Mozilla</A>	 
		<?php print _("or") ?> 
		<A HREF='http://www.opera.com'>Opera</A>, <?php print _("had to change the user agent settings faking they were using Internet Explorer or Netscape, to enter these sites") ?> 
		<BR><?php print _("(Note: for Firefox, if you change to Internet Explorer, also the OS") ?> 
		<A HREF='http://www.chrispederick.com/work/firefox/useragentswitcher/'><?php print _("is set to Windows XP") ?></A>). 
		<BR><?php print _("Not changing these settings again the") ?>
		<A HREF='http://konqueror.kde.org/'>Konqueror</A>, <?php print _("Opera and other browsers are then counted as being Microsoft Internet Explorer or Netscape browsers.") ?> 
  
	<P>
		<?php print _("One answer is that stats may be confusing - you can never tell what you measure unless you say how you measure it.") ?> 
 
	<P>
		<?php print _("Another is simply that a lot of Linux users use a different OS for gaming / browsing - a few years ago, a quick peek at the Linux Counter, which is about as diehard Linux as they come, showed that more than 60% of those registering as Linux users used a Windows browser to do so.") ?> 
 
	<P>
	
		<H3><?php print _("Future") ?></H3> 
 
		<BR><?php print _("One possible conclusion is that the \"zealotry\" of Linux users is not quite so big as it's claimed..... check out the continuing browser evolution from my Webalizer statistics.") ?> 

		<H6><?php print _("Still not satisfied? Well - there's only one thing to do. Get out there and work on getting better numbers! Please mail any new ways to get estimates to us!") ?> </H6>
 
<?php print _("Have fun!") ?> 
<?php pagebottom("yes") ?>
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